Data sgp is an excellent tool for evaluating student learning in the context of the Common Core standards. It provides an effective means of comparing the performance of students across grades, schools, districts and states. In addition to being useful in identifying high and low performers, this data can help teachers improve their instruction by providing them with the information they need to make appropriate adjustments to classroom practice.
To get the most from your SGP analyses, you need to have access to a comprehensive set of data. Fortunately, Michigan districts like Macomb and Clare-Gladwin have made their SGP data available in formats compatible with operational SGP analyses. Additionally, the sgpData data set includes an exemplary sgpData_INSTRUCTOR_NUMBER lookup table that allows districts to link instructors to students through unique identifiers associated with each test record.
These data sets can be used in conjunction with lower level SGP functions such as studentGrowthPercentiles and studentGrowthProjections. To use these functions, you will need to provide a list of student records that include the students unique identifiers, grade level and date associated with each assessment occurrence. In most cases, this information can be found in a spreadsheet program such as Excel. However, you should be aware that this data must be converted to LONG format before use with these functions.
The SGP package includes comprehensive documentation, vignettes and examples that explain its calculations and processes in detail. The vignettes and examples are designed to be useful to users of all skill levels. Moreover, the higher level function abcSGP and updateSGP combine lower level functions into one function call, simplifying the source code associated with operational analyses.
SGP is also designed to support analyses using state specific meta-data provided in the sgpData data set. In fact, many higher level SGP functions assume that a user has loaded the state specific meta-data into the sgpData data set. SGP also includes an exemplar data set called sgpData that models the format of the data required by the lower level functions.
SGP can be very time consuming to implement, especially when large datasets are being processed and analyzed. Therefore, it is important to develop an efficient process for managing SGP data. Ideally, an organization should develop a workflow that minimizes the manual steps involved in generating and analyzing SGP data, while still providing flexibility for those who need to customize the data for their particular analyses. This can be accomplished by implementing a series of processes that automate the most repetitive tasks. In addition, organizations should develop a method for distributing SGP data in a timely manner. This will reduce the amount of work that needs to be performed by individuals and can help ensure that the SGP data is updated consistently. Moreover, this will make it easier for individual users to find the data they need when performing analyses. This will allow users to focus more on interpreting the data and making decisions that will lead to better instructional practices.